CHCI Welcomes new member Clara Suong!

Clara Suong is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science. She completed her MA in Politics in 2009 from New York University followed by another MA in 2011 in Political Science from SUNY Stony Brook. She received her PhD in Political Science from the University of California, San Diego, in 2018. She studies the role of information in international relations, using computational, formal, and experimental methods. Her research interests include international relations, international security, diplomacy, computational social science, survey experiments, and formal modeling. 

Suong states her interests in this way: "I study the role of information in international and national security politics, using computational, formal, and experimental methods. Substantively, my own research focuses on how information and communicative acts affect conflict processes at the domestic-international nexus. Methodologically, my research falls in the realm of computational social science and utilizes computational tools, Natural Language Processing and text-as-data approaches, in particular.

“For example, I am continuing my research about foreign influence that I started during my postdoc years at NYU and Duke, where I participated in U.S. government-funded projects measuring great powers’ online and offline influence on developing countries’ politics, using Natural Language Processing and machine learning tools. The CHCI membership will help me extend my research on the ramifications of incorporating technology in international politics.

“My current research focuses on the political dynamics of online and offline intra- and inter-government communication and how it affects the security of countries, including the U.S., Russia, China, Japan, Brazil, Sweden, and Ukraine. It will be intellectually stimulating to interact with fellow researchers sharing my interest in the ramifications of incorporating technology into various aspects of society and individuals.”